


Another Language of Love

by Maddy02



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: F/M, Flower Language, Fluff, Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Romance, verdant wind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:29:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25725925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maddy02/pseuds/Maddy02
Summary: Claude is a master communicator. He always gets his message across.Sometimes, he doesn't even use words.
Relationships: My Unit | Byleth/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 9
Kudos: 112
Collections: A Merry Kind of War





	Another Language of Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Anam_Writes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anam_Writes/gifts).



> I had thought, in my naivety, that the Anam Alliance and the Empire of Maddy could live in peace. 
> 
> I had thought that [The Skeptic Loved his Goddess](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23673772) was a peace offering. That we were, at least, in armistice.  
> Then the Kingdom of Runic attacked the Anam Alliance and I delayed the truce. I was debating if, perhaps, I should take on the Kingdom of Runic in defence of my potential ally.  
> However that attack was clearly a ploy! A trick designed to get the Kingdom and the Alliance into talks, as the next thing I know they have both attacked the Empire! Launching twin attacks [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25040593), and [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25040434)! With absolutely no provocation on the Empires part. None whatsoever. At all. I wasn’t up until 4am and you can’t prove otherwise!
> 
> Clearly that “truce” was not worth the paper it wasn’t written on!!
> 
> Therefore, the war continues! The Anam alliance will pay for their treachery!

Claude had thought the battle won. The roundtable had come around, troops and supplies were secured for the march into Adrestia. Lorenz had wrangled his father into some form of compliance, Hilda continued to wrangle the Knights of Seiros into Garreg Mach's upkeep and Teach understood his reasons for using her position within the church.

But of course she did, Teach was practical, she had a mercenary's intuition for using whatever advantage you had.

And so it blindsided him when, with only fourteen words, she reminded him of the great blunder he had made in keeping her favour.

"Is there any chance… Do you still have my father's love letters? The diary?"

Claude froze. He swallowed heavily as the weight of his eighteen year-old self's miscalculation hit him all at once. "Yes," he managed "of course, I'll return it to you directly, I should have thought of it myself."

Teach shook her head and gave him the faintest of smiles "It's alright, you've been dealing with… a lot." She summarised, unaware of the revelation happening in the Duke's mind.

That wasn't _Teach_ asking, his best commander, no, _that_ was _Byleth,_ his friend. His best friend.

She had asked him for something personal. Exposed a desire, a want, a weakness. Re-exposed it. He had known this already. She had let him in before, trusted him with all her secrets; the voice in her head, the loss of a Goddess, her unbeating heart. She _trusted_ him, and he had not been considerate of _her,_ not outwith his grand schemes, not in the true manner of consideration.

In his unwavering belief that she, they, could do anything together, he _had_ almost forgotten that she had hopes of her own. He had apologised for using her as a tool, but he saw now that that had been lip-service. He had not accounted for the risk of _losing_ _her_.

Teach was instrumental to his plans, but _Byleth_ was- Stars above, _Byleth_ was-

"Claude?"

He startled out of his thoughts and directed a practised smile her way. "I suppose five years of war is _some_ excuse, but really, I'll get it back to you by days end."

She eyed him for a moment, but nodded in that simple, calm manner of hers, leaving Claude to the turmoil of his own heart.

~o~*~o~

When Byleth found the diary on her desk that evening, there was a single stem of lily-of-the-valley resting upon it.

"Apology."

~o~*~o~

Nobody who thought about it for more than a minute was surprised by the idea that Claude "it's only a mild stomach poison" von Riegan would mix his own teas. That _Duke Riegan_ would find the time to cut and dry the chamomile himself was perhaps more of a stretch.

After Grondor, nobody questioned anyone taking a moment of time to themselves.

Claude was in the greenhouse early enough that nobody else was there to disturb the peace. Except, of course, Byleth. If her silent presence could be said to be a disturbance. That he _didn_ _'t_ feel the need to fill the silence between them was one of the things Claude liked best about her; they could exist peacefully in each other's space. Her occupied silence was a comfortable, grounding force keeping him steady as his thoughts ran away from him to schemes and contingencies for a thousand situations.

Her silent presence was so comfortable that he lingered long after he'd cut himself enough chamomile to restock his supply, twisting and braiding a few extra stems together.

Inevitably, the time came when he could no longer hide in the greenhouse.

Byleth looked round as he made motions to leave, offering him a quick smile. He returned it, catching her hand and sliding a chain of chamomile flowers onto her wrist as though it was something much more substantial. Diamonds or emeralds. He pressed her hand briefly and departed.

She wasn't wearing it when he saw her at the war table later in the day, but that was alright, it hadn't been his best work.

~o~*~o~

Five chamomile flowers.

"Serenity through adversity."

~o~*~o~

Claude understood the value of misdirection. If he was doing something overtly you could be certain he was using it as a distraction for at least three covert ploys.

Courting Byleth was not something he was going to make a show of.

Teach's lack of surprise at Almyran reinforcements showing up to the fight at Fort Merceus, coupled with the long conversations they'd been having were starting to raise eyebrows; even though those interactions had been largely innocent and on-task.

Largely. He might, perhaps, have said one or two things that hinted towards his personal plans and feelings. Perhaps. Just a little.

So he did what he did best. He talked. He diverted questions about famous Almyran generals with a wink. He praised their troops with sincerity. He left nobody in any doubt that they had come as far as they had, and would go all the way to the steps of Enbarr, thanks to Teach. He praised her command and tactics openly; moral rose and eyebrows lowered. No-one need know that when they took tea together behind closed doors it was not as Duke Riegan and Commander Eisner, but Claude and Byleth.

He was so convincing that nobody realised that the corsage of Dagda sunflowers (smaller than their Fódlan cousins, and tending more to red than yellow) that he pinned to her coat after they took Enbarr was anything more than an impromptu medal. They didn't see that Claude was disguising the tear in her armour sustained in the fight with Edelgard. That he was taking his time about it so she had a moment to shore up her defences, so they both had a moment to breathe before they would face the troops together. When they would deliver the news that the war was not yet over.

Nobody except Byleth that was. The steady gaze she set on him before they turned to the crowd spoke volumes of her gratitude and determination.

The legend went that the crimson sunflowers had bloomed where the first Dagdan blood had spilt on Fódlan soil, and they grew each year through the fierce will of the people of Fódlan to defend their homeland. He hoped they could rely upon that same determination to carry them forwards once more.

~o~*~o~

A trio of Dagda sunflowers.

"Loyalty, returned"

~o~*~o~

It occurred to him, in a burst of breath-stealing panic, that Byleth might not come to the Goddess tower.

She might not get his note until too late. She might be delayed. She didn't know, as he did, that he was on a deadline.

She might choose not to come.

He didn't _think_ that would be the case, but having thought of it, no matter how he assured himself that they walked in step, he couldn't set it aside. This note _could_ be the last communication they had in… a long time.

But there was too much that could not be _written_. Too much he had to say in person.

Too much that he could not chance being intercepted.

He did what he could with it.

~o~*~o~

When Byleth returned to her room from the tower she went directly for the envelope Claude's note had been delivered in and tipped the rest of the contents out.

"Forget-me-not"

~o~*~o~

"Claude! We'll be late!" his wife, (Stars, _his_ _wife_ ) called from the entrance to their suite.

"They can't start without us! We're kinda important you know!" The King of Unification called back.

"It's rude!" she continued.

"I'll be just a second!" he returned, scrambling across the desk for the map he'd _just_ _had_ a moment ago.

"One!" Byleth replied without missing a beat.

"Okay, maybe a minute." he answered, even though he could _feel_ her deadpan stare through the two walls that separated them "Aha!" he added in triumph, pulling the map across towards him. As he did, a stack of books on the edge toppled over and he cursed under his breath as he stooped to set them upright again.

Something slipped from the pile, and he looked at it in confusion for a moment as he put the stack on the desk.

Lying innocently on the floor was a chain of dried, pressed chamomile.

He picked it up carefully and tried to identify where it had come from. A couple sheets of tissue-paper were poking out from one of the books and he lifted it out to-

-it was Jeralt's diary.

Even as he recognised it, the book fell open to another page, with another set of tissue-paper tucked inside. Pressed between the sheets were a couple of the bright anemones that had been woven through Byleth's hair when they were wed. He remembered the petals falling around them as he'd spun her through their first dance as husband and wife, recalled the scent of them as he'd kissed her. Another page, more flowers pressed between -violets from the private gardens of the Palace in Almyra. Another, containing a stem of lily-of-the-valley. A posy of forget-me-nots. Three Dagda sunflowers. A single, perfect, rose -purloined from Gloucester and delivered to her window on wyvern-back after one of his longer sojourns from her side.

Every flower he'd ever presented her, pressed and preserved, kept safely with her most precious possession.

"Claude?" she called, and he startled from his thoughts. He found the page the chamomile had fallen from and slipped it back into place, tucked neatly inside once more.

He moved quickly to the door. Before Byleth could say anything more he had taken her face in both hands and pulled her in to a deep kiss, as though he could possibly press even a fraction of what he felt into her. When he pulled back she was flushed and smiling, eyebrows raised in bemusement and he-

-kissed her again, long and sweet.

There were some things, he found, that could never be properly expressed in words alone.


End file.
